ACen Report

I found myself in Chicago this past weekend for ACen, Anime Central, and was surprised by the vast improvements that had been made to the function and flow of the event.

Lines for registration in previous years have gone into the double digit hours (10+) long wait. It used to be true that you needed to bring a snack and a game to play. But as many others have observed, the wait to get your badge was significantly reduced this year over all.

It was a blessed improvement over the many hours long waits in line.

I wandered thoroughly through the artist’s alley and the vendor’s room in an attempt to see what people were doing and what I found was that most artists are doing similar handy crafts… like buttons, or magnets made out of those melty beads that you iron… Most of the artwork on display looks similar to one another, and so was not as interesting as it could have been.

I did however see the SNAFU Comics booth and bought a Dexter and a Zim badge. It was amazing that Dexter’s design by Bleedman was ripped off so much for Fusion Fold.

Spent about two hours in line to get into the rave on saturday, it was a pretty good event, lots of glowy shit. Only downside is that people don’t know how to dance or were too worn out from waiting in line to actually get into the mood.